Feeding the Paterno Trolls

I'm breaking one of the most important laws of the Internet, but I can't resist. It's a topic I've touched on on more than one occasion, and one to revisit again today.

This morning the Paterno family released a report to counter the finding Louis Freeh made last year. In what came as a total shocker, the report pretty much absolved Joe Paterno of any and all responsibilities for the heinous crimes of Jerry Sandusky. It's entirely possible they also made some other wild claims, though those are disputed (note: this link is satire, and is not meant to be taken with any degree of seriousness).

While I admittedly did not read through the entirety of the Paternos' report, I did read most of the first 40 or so pages. Honestly, to completely dismiss this report as biased garbage would not be smart, as one could argue the Freeh report was much the same since it was commissioned by the Penn State Board of Trustees. The attorneys who contributed to this most recent report did have some good claims.

The main argument that seems to be used here is that Joe Paterno was duped into believing that Jerry Sandusky was actually a good man who cared about kids.

"The entire Penn State community, including Joe Paterno, was fooled by Jerry Sandusky. Joe Paterno missed the red flags of child molestation, and he never believed Sandusky was a child molester due to the proven behavioral and psychological dynamics and blind spots created by 'nice-guy' acquaintance child sex offenders. This case, if analyzed correctly through the lens of criminal and psychological research, can serve as a model for the public to learn how to identify and prevent child sexual victimization...

"Expert analysis, not surprisingly, shows that such a profile is not unique to Sandusky. It is common in many other case studies of prominent child molesters who hide in plain sight by cultivating and leveraging community trust to escape detection, even in the face of key signs that, in hindsight, indicated child abuse. That fact — the cognitive disconnect between what the community believes it knows about one of its well-regarded members and its inability to reconcile and accept what it later learns about signposts of child abuse — is a behavioral, medical, and psychological reality that repeatedly allows pedophiles to explain away complaints of inappropriate activity. Often, recognition of child molesters is even more difficult for those colleagues or friends who work or socialize most frequently with the child molester, as their own personal experiences and belief that they know the person well in some capacity allows them to accept alternative explanations in the absence of training on how to identify a sophisticated and manipulative child molester." -pages 9-10

To an extent, I can buy this explanation. Sandusky would have done everything in his power to paint himself as the character he did to keep his access to children. But that argument can only hold water for so long in the context of the situation.

These attorneys also attack the core of Freeh's evidence in the emails that were sent, in particular attacking their specificity. It's a good move as well; Freeh does make assumptions about the emails referring to Joe Paterno, though this is where the attorneys' case falls apart in my view.

This is the issue I can't get past. In 1998, Sandusky is investigated by the authorities for reported child sexual abuse. Ultimately nothing comes of it since the authorities supposedly don't have enough to go off of here. Emails are sent about about the incident saying "I have touched base with the coach" and "Coach is anxious to know where it stands." While these are most definitely vague and don't necessarily refer to Joe Paterno, to assume he didn't know about this incident is asinine. Sandusky was still on the football staff at this time. Paterno would surely have known his defensive coordinator was being investigated, either from other Penn State staff or from being contacted by the authorities. On the off chance he didn't know, the administration is not doing a good job keeping the inside of their house in order and we still have a lack of institutional control.

Fast forward to 2001 and the Mike McQueary incident. The attorneys claim that Paterno's elevation of McQueary's story to his bosses is enough, but they claim Paterno "promptly" told his superiors. While he claimed he didn't remember exactly when he told his superiors, Paterno explicitly said during his grand jury testimony, "I ordinarily would have called people right away, but it was a Saturday morning and I didn’t want to interfere with their weekends." This at best shows the misunderstanding the attorneys argue for with the "acquaintance child sex offender" point, but I think there's more to it than that.

Let's say the attorneys are correct with their following conclusion:

"(1) Joe Paterno never asked or told anyone not to discuss or to hide in any way the information reported by Mike McQueary; (2) Joe Paterno never asked or told anyone to limit the investigation of Mike McQueary’s report in any way, and (3) Joe Paterno never asked or told anyone, including Tim Curley, Gary Schultz and Graham Spanier, not to report Mike McQueary’s story as deemed appropriate."-page 26

The following fact still remains true, and this is ultimately what convinces me beyond a shadow of a doubt that Paterno, Curley, Schulz and Spanier (and even Mike McQueary) are all guilty. These men (other than McQueary with the possible exception of Paterno if you want to give this new report the benefit of the doubt) all knew about the 1998 incident. To hear about another incident in 2001 from a completely different source would lend credence to the first report, even if law enforcement dropped their investigation, and would have given not only Paterno, but all those men the responsibility to get police involved again. They didn't, and a pedophile was allowed to roam free for another decade.

The Paterno family has the right to point the finger elsewhere, as there are other responsible parties that still have to answer for what they did and what they failed to do. But they also need to look deep inside themselves and realize their dear patriarch, for all his "I didn’t come to work every day for sixty-one years. I was sick a couple days, and there were other things, like when David [Paterno’s son] got hurt. I don’t know if I’d say that’s completely honest," moments of integrity, this black spot still remains on his legacy. As John Kincade said before we really realized just how deep this went, we need to take everything about Joe Paterno with regards to his legacy: both the men he shaped and the young lives he allowed to be destroyed.

The Sports Culture Problem

I am a sports fan, but it should not take precedence over life and death. Not ever.


I wrote these words back in January pertaining to both Joe Paterno and the Kyle Williams situation. I looked back at some of my words and I'm a little dumbfounded at how naive I was to think Paterno had merely been a guy who "wished he could have done more" considering what has come to light in the past 6 months. I revisit it now because these words really resonate today following Penn State's punishment for failing to do anything about Jerry Sandusky.

Many of us place sports as a very high priority in our lives. We carve out time in our schedules to watch our teams play all the big games. Many are not afraid to drop big bucks to go see their teams in person or buy memorabilia. Sports have become big business, even in the so-called "amateur" ranks like intercollegiate athletics. The big schools lose tons of money just for the "honor and prestige" of playing in a meaningless bowl game. We have March Madness that takes offices and sports bars by storm with bracketology. You have sports blogs everywhere like this one, or Geoffy's about the Bulls, or my friend Nathaniel starting up an NFL blog within the past couple days. Eventually we have to weigh the importance of sports against everything else in life.

And that's where the Penn State scandal comes into play. We had an assistant coach who retired after one incident of child sexual abuse, then saw it come to the attention of the school again a few years later, only for the most powerful men at the institution to do nothing about it. Once they were caught, a legendary head coach gets fired and many students are upset about it. As more facts get released, many people realize how duped they were by the bad leaders at Penn State. And yet there are some people that continue to defend the institution, despite all the evidence for why the school deserves condemnation.

Reading through the message board in the ESPN article I linked to above, I was dumbfounded reading many fans (a large chunk of which are Penn State students, alums, or fans, though not all) claiming that the punishment is unfair or too harsh, or even targets the wrong people since this supposedly "wasn't a football issue". This highlights the problem with the football culture at Penn State. To this day, some people are still more concerned with what happened to the program than what happened to the unfortunate victims whose lives will never be the same after their time in State College, PA.


Regarding the punishments, I think they are fair. Funds need to be sent out to deal with child abuse and preferably at programs that teach people what to watch out for in a potential abuser or signs that a child might have been abused as well as support for victims. But the sanctions on the football program are also entirely justified. A pedophile who was a coach for some time and later a major face of a "charity" used the Penn State football program to lure in potential victims, groom them, and take advantage of them. The program was not only the bait, but the willing co-conspirator in that Joe Paterno reportedly talked 3 other head honchos out of turning Sandusky over to the proper authorities in 2001, after there had already been a report of sexual abuse. Once is one thing. If you hear 2 different reports about 2 different incidents from 2 different people, odds are there is some truth there.

Penn State apologists still continue to defend their school and late coach, saying that with Paterno passed on, Sandusky behind bars, Spanier fired, and Schultz and Curley facing jail time as well, the perpetrators are gone and no punishment is needed as the legal system is taking care of it. While this is true to an extent, the program needs punishment. The NCAA needed an example of what could happen when an institution treats an athletic program with more care and concern than the welfare of children, and said culture at Penn State was obvious and needed to be rooted out. Many called for the death penalty, though I think that would have been a little overkill. This will still be a painful lesson for Happy Valley. You cannot treat a football program with more care and concern than children who are being raped. Period.

This wrongful prioritizing is rampant in people quick to say this unfairly punishes the student athletes who will no longer get the experience of a bowl game, though players are free to transfer and coaches from other schools are already circling the big time guys. Penn State is lucky they still even have a football team and didn't get the death penalty. The businesses in the area can still get their game day traffic and hopefully we can see some of the proceeds from PSU football go to the victims or a child abuse charity. This punishment is intended to change the culture at Penn State from a "win-at-all-costs"

But the most important thing to take away from this incident is a warning for all of us, not just Penn Staters. We are human. We all make mistakes, some worlds bigger than others. But to an extent we are part of the sports culture problem. Some fans have a win at all costs mentality, and while it's not necessarily a bad thing, Penn State proved it can be dangerous. We all need to remember that regardless of the sport and the team, sports and winning are not the most important thing. It's connecting with other people, having respect for your fellow human beings, and spending time with the people we love. No amount of championships can ever compete with the love you get from friends and family.

And if you do decide that the program and wins are all that matters, what price are you willing to pay?

A Legend Tarnished

Growing up I never watched college football and really had no idea who Joe Paterno was, other than a guy who had been around Penn State forever. That's why I didn't really have a whole lot of insight when he passed away in January. But his legacy was definitely being overshadowed by the whole Sandusky case, a blight on college football and that little corner of Pennsylvania. But in light of the CNN reports that have recently come out, the damage is much greater than we feared.

I was in the camp before this came to light that Paterno had to have known something and was, to an extent, responsible for the atrocities in Happy Valley. None of us realized how right we were. In listening to John Kincade talk about it, he encouraged people (myself included) to read the article. It was eye-opening to say the least. But it also made me think back to a little over a year ago as I was finishing up my bachelor's degree.